Five

by Ursula P Archer

  Slow.

  Cold, completely cold.

  Was his sudden silence connected to Dalamasso? Was he frustrated that he couldn’t get close to her?

  No, she thought. He could have got to Melanie before we solved the puzzle that led us to her. Like he did with Estermann.

  Melanie. Beatrice had saved her mother’s number in her mobile. She’d have to act fast, otherwise she’d lose her nerve.

  ‘Dalamasso.’

  ‘Good evening, this is Beatrice Kaspary from the LKA.’

  A deep sigh. ‘Yes?’ Just one syllable, filled with contempt. But at least the woman hadn’t hung up.

  ‘I’d like to apologise for my behaviour. It was unacceptable. How is Melanie?’

  ‘She’s … she’s doing a little better. But she’s still trying to self-harm, and is hardly sleeping at all, except with the help of strong sedatives.’

  ‘I’m very sorry.’

  No answer this time.

  ‘Did you want anything else?’ asked Carolin Dalamasso eventually. Curt, icy, clearly hoping that she didn’t.

  ‘Yes, to be honest. I’d like to ask you something.’ She took the silence at the other end of the line as consent. ‘Did Melanie used to react to things that extremely? Were there any events or triggers that upset her as much as those photos?’

  She was expecting a dismissive answer, or none at all, but she was wrong.

  ‘Children.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘She had strong reactions to children a few times, particularly loud ones. But only in the first year after her breakdown, and then it seemed to pass.’ Carolin Dalamasso sighed. ‘When she was at school, there were some children who bullied her a lot. The doctors think these memories might have been triggered by the sight of children.’

  ‘I understand.’ Yes, I really believe I do, but not in the way you think. ‘Thank you, Frau Dalamasso. I wish Melanie all the best. My colleagues will continue to look out for her.’

  ‘I know. Are we finished now?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you again. Goodby—’ The rest of the word was swallowed by the beeping of the disconnect tone. Carolin Dalamasso had hung up.

  The suspicion which Beatrice carried around with her that evening and the whole of the next day was much too vague to be uttered out loud to the others. When Florin questioned her on how quiet she was, she fobbed him off with an answer as brief as it was nondescript, and after that he left her alone with her thoughts.

  Several times, Beatrice caught herself sitting and staring at the surface of her desk. To any onlooker, it must have seemed as though she wasn’t doing a thing, but inside her mind the kaleidoscope was turning incessantly, equipped with a few new fragments.

  Drasche’s surprise about the fingerprints. The Owner’s silence. An IV needle.

  The varying difficulty levels of the puzzles. And what was the point of them anyway?

  Then the references to Evelyn, which she should have understood a lot sooner.

  ‘Coffee?’ Florin was standing next to the espresso machine, holding up two cups.

  She stopped herself from snapping at him for interrupting her train of thought. ‘Yes, please. Strong.’

  He pressed the buttons. ‘When are you going to tell me what’s going on in your head?’

  ‘When I’m sure it’s not just nonsense.’

  ‘Okay.’ It was clear he wasn’t content with the answer. ‘But I’d really prefer it if we could all discuss new approaches as a team. Or at least between the two of us.’

  ‘We will. When I’m ready.’ He would just have to be annoyed at her. Some threads of thought are so delicate that they tear and blow away if you try to put them into words. ‘Give me another few hours.’ In her mind’s eye, she saw the needle stuck into Sigart’s vein. It seemed inconceivable. If you’re that fond of him, I’ll keep him for you until the end.

  The end, thought Beatrice, can’t be that far away now.

  She left the office earlier than usual; Florin’s probing looks were too off-putting. The feeling that her thoughts were going round in circles evaporated as soon as she stepped out into the fresh air.

  The children were spending the evening at Mooserhof again; Achim had to take a client out for dinner. In those circumstances, of course, handing over the children was completely fine. Everything was always fine if he did it. But at least he had taken them to her mother’s, where they would be content.

  When she arrived at the restaurant, Jakob clung to her like a monkey on a tree. ‘I want to go home,’ he mumbled. ‘Are you taking us with you tonight?’

  Soon. Next week. Tomorrow. She pulled him close and buried her face in his hair. ‘We’re almost finished. Listen – either we catch the guy in the next three days, or I’ll tell Florin that he has to keep looking by himself. Then I’ll just do a few smaller things and I’ll even be able to pick you up from school every day too.’

  ‘Honest?’

  ‘I promise.’ The thought of giving up the case she had been so intensely involved in from the start made a painful hole in her pride. But it had already had too much of an impact on the children.

  ‘Cool!’ Jakob jumped down to go and tell his Oma the happy news.

  Beatrice hugged Mina. ‘I’m so looking forward to having you both back with me,’ she said, feeling Mina nod against her chest.

  They spent the evening eating and playing cards in the restaurant. Beatrice tried very hard to lose at Mau-Mau, and ate fried beef and onions in gravy, realising with surprise that she was incredibly hungry. Richard served her a taster dessert plate, of which she didn’t leave a single crumb.

  ‘Three days?’ Jakob checked, as she put him to bed.

  ‘Three days and not one more.’

  On the way home, she tried with all her might to convince herself that she wouldn’t mind taking a step back. Stefan could take over her tasks and pass his own to Bechner. And then I’ll do Bechner’s stuff, she thought. All those menial tasks I give him.

  Before she had a chance to smile at the thought, her mobile rang.

  ‘Sigart has disappeared.’ Florin sounded fraught. ‘The hospital has already been searched. Theoretically it’s still possible that he just pulled the IV line out and decided to go for a walk, but no one has seen him for two hours.’

  The information sank in Beatrice’s stomach like a stone. The kaleidoscope turned yet again. ‘Okay, I’m near Theodebertstrasse right now, so I’ll drive past his flat and see if there’s a light on.’

  ‘Okay. Keep me posted.’

  Beatrice looked at the clock. It was just before 10 p.m. She could park the car opposite the postal depot and walk across to Theodebertstrasse on foot.

  At number thirty-three, it was dark behind the windows of the first floor. She stopped in front of the entrance and thought of the blood they had found here last time. AB negative, rare and precious. Her thoughts raced on. Blood transfusions. IV needles.

  A car drove past, and for a few seconds the headlights blinded her, making her feel strangely vulnerable. Then the beam of light fell on something else.

  A red Honda Civic, parked diagonally opposite.

  It wasn’t a rare model of car by any means. But it was an interesting coincidence nonetheless. Beatrice quickly crossed the street and could already feel the disappointment bearing down on her shoulders as she approached. It couldn’t be Nora’s car; it had Hungarian number plates. But just to make sure she wasn’t overlooking anything, Beatrice leant down to peer into the passenger-side window. The hazy street lighting fell on two empty, crumpled-up water bottles, a newspaper and a leather bag.

  She squinted, trying to see more clearly. So perhaps it was Nora’s car after all. It wasn’t yet hard proof, of course, she would need to break into the car and—

  ‘How convenient. I was just on my way to you.’

  She didn’t get a chance to turn around towards the voice. A blow to her neck, a sharp, burning pain, and the world disappeared into a racing vortex, a whirlpool tugging her a
way into nothingness.

  Blows all over her body. Her legs, her back, her behind. As if through thick cotton wool. Everywhere but her head. Then emptiness again.

  Come up for air. Time has vanished. Open eyes … can’t. Darkness. Drifting in and out of consciousness.

  Her breathing was slow and heavy. It was the first thing she became aware of, and it filled her with a vague sensation of gratitude at still being alive. She tried to grasp what had happened, wanting to remember, but the thoughts slipped out of her mind like wet soap through her fingers.

  At least her body was obeying her. She flexed her toes, coughed. She wanted to hold her head, but her hands wouldn’t move. Beatrice opened her eyes.

  She knew this place. But where from? She didn’t like it, but she knew she had been here before. With … a man. Not her ex-husband, another man – Florin.

  As if his name had been the password to her memory, everything rushed back to her, not neatly ordered, but in a torrent. She swallowed, with difficulty, and deliberately ignored the ridged, filthy wood of the table in front of her. Once again, she tried to move her hands away from her body.

  A dull pain shot through her; she still couldn’t do it. I’m tied up, she thought, picturing the woman in the cow pasture in her mind, the cable tie around her wrists. She just couldn’t remember the woman’s name. Everything was blurry and out of focus, as if she was floating through murky water. But she was sitting down. On a chair, and her hands were … behind her.

  Nora Papenberg, she finally remembered. That was her name.

  She closed her eyes, trying to find her way back into her mind. But now the pain was breaking out of the thickly insulated room it had been lurking in. It bit hard into her back. Into her hips. Her wrists. Beatrice tensed her shoulder muscles. It was bearable, just about. A small price to pay for a clear head. She listened.

  Someone was here. Quiet footsteps in the background, a rustling sound. If she twisted her upper body just a little, she would be able to see him. But it was too soon for that; she had to get a grip of herself first. If he gave her enough time, that was.

  ‘Good evening,’ said a voice behind her. Quiet and polite.

  So she had been right.

  ‘Good evening, Herr Sigart.’ She waited for him to come over and sit opposite her at the table, but he didn’t move. No footsteps on the stone floor.

  She tried to remember what was behind her. The noose hanging from the ceiling. Nora Papenberg’s shoes, as red as the picture in Florin’s atelier, as red as the blood on Evelyn’s bedroom floor. Dried bandaging fabric in crusted waves.

  No, of course not. The forensics team had taken all that with them.

  The saws were gone now too, but Drasche had left the table and chairs, still speckled in places with forensic powder. On the floor, at the foot of the steps, there was something new: the doctor’s bag Beatrice had seen on the passenger seat of the Honda Civic.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Sigart asked the question as if he was a surgeon who had just operated on her.

  Beatrice decided to play along. She just had to break free from her ties, then she would have an advantage over him. He was weakened; there was no way he could use his left hand.

  ‘I’m relatively okay,’ she answered. ‘Still a little blurry in the head. And my hips feel bruised.’

  ‘Yes, unfortunately that couldn’t be avoided.’ Finally, Sigart stepped aside, far enough for her to be able to see him. He was still pale, but he seemed taller than he had before. His left hand was bandaged, the dressing stretching all the way to his elbow. ‘I wasn’t able to carry you, so I had to drag you. I’m afraid that gave you a few bruises.’

  ‘I see.’ Was he still on painkillers? Probably. ‘You’re clearly doing much better than before. When I saw you in the hospital, I thought—’ I thought what I was supposed to think. Beatrice left the sentence unfinished.

  Sigart walked all the way around the table, then sat down. In his right, healthy hand, he was holding a gun, which he now laid on the scratched table, the barrel pointing at Beatrice. ‘I’m pleased that we finally get to talk alone.’

  The dull, cotton-wool-like sensation in her head still hadn’t completely disappeared. What did Sigart want from her?

  I’m his audience, as Kossar had put it. Hopefully he had been right on that point at least.

  ‘You probably want to hear that I’m surprised,’ she said. ‘But I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you there.’ She held his gaze, even though fear was now stretching its cold feelers out towards her throat. Whatever narcotic Sigart had injected her with, it was losing its effect.

  He cocked his head to the side. ‘How long have you known?’

  ‘Since I went to see you in the hospital. With all the blood you lost, we expected you to be on the brink of death. I might have thought of it sooner if you were a doctor, but you’re a vet.’ She saw a smile creep across his face. ‘But of course you still know how to take blood, how to store it, and how much there had to be to make us draw the right conclusions. Or, rather, the wrong ones. What did you use to create the drag marks in the stairwell? A sandbag?’

  ‘Something like that.’

  ‘From the very first time we met you, you were always so pale. But in the hospital, you looked healthier – and it was because you had more blood in your veins than in the previous weeks. The spray pattern on the walls – did you compress the bag of blood and then punch a hole in it?’

  ‘Precisely. Bravo, Beatrice.’

  Something in the tone of his voice unsettled her, but she carried on regardless. ‘You also know how to carry out a local anaesthetic – probably better than any hospital surgeon, who always has an anaesthetist on standby for that. But I still don’t know how you managed to cut your own fingers off.’

  He lifted the bandaged hand off the table a little and put it back down again carefully. ‘By imagining this moment, right here and now. Tell me what else you worked out, Beatrice.’

  She thought for a moment. ‘That you know about Evelyn and think we have something in common. Guilt as a result of bad decisions. Where did you get your information from?’

  ‘You have quite a talkative brother. I’m sure you don’t know this, but my wife and I used to eat at Mooserhof quite frequently. We both read about Evelyn Rieger’s murder, and knew from your brother that you were friends with her. Every time I asked about you, he quite willingly opened his heart to me. You were still in Vienna then, trying to get back on your feet, but your brother was convinced you wouldn’t manage. My wife and I had many conversations about guilt back then.’ He shifted his gaze to the two remaining fingers on his left hand. ‘At the time, I was of the opinion that the only person to carry guilt is the one who intentionally harms someone. Miriam disagreed. She said that guilt never falls on just one person alone.’

  Beatrice could see that he was withdrawing into himself, hearing his wife’s voice in his mind as if she were right next to him.

  ‘After her death, I knew she was right. I was immensely guilty. My wrong decisions, my skewed priorities. You know the feeling, don’t you, Beatrice? That’s why I put my case in your hands.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I made sure you would be on duty when Nora Papenberg was found. That granted her an extra day of life.’

  A day of fear and despair, of futile hope. She hoped he would give her an extra day, too. ‘Keep me posted,’ Florin had said. When would he expect to hear from her? After an hour? Two? Maybe even sooner? He was probably already pulling out all the stops to find her.

  She shifted her weight, trying to feel whether her mobile was still in her jacket pocket. If it was, her colleagues would be able to find out her location.

  But she couldn’t feel anything. Perhaps it had fallen out when Sigart had dragged her down the steps, or outside, in the forest. That would be just as good – no, even better, as he would have no chance of finding it …

  Then she saw it. On a pile of bricks that someone must have l
eft in the corner of the cellar. It lay alongside Nora Papenberg’s Nokia, and next to it, like small, rectangular playing pieces from a board game, were the batteries.

  Sigart followed her gaze. ‘Yes, unfortunately you are un-contactable,’ he said. ‘But you still managed to send your colleague a text from Theodebertstrasse. “Driving home now, I’m shattered. See you tomorrow.” That should have won us a little time.’

  She wanted to scream, not knowing whether it was out of rage, panic, or just to lose herself in her own cries. Instead, she bit down on her lower lip until it hurt. Driving home now, I’m shattered. But no word as to whether she had found Sigart. Maybe that would have made Florin wonder. If so, he would have tried to call her back, only getting the mailbox. Was shattered enough to make him leave it? Or would he persevere, maybe drive to her place just to be sure?

  She didn’t know.

  ‘Nonetheless,’ Sigart continued, ‘we don’t have all the time in the world. I asked you what you’ve understood of what’s happened, but you haven’t yet given me your answer. I need you to concentrate.’ He picked up the gun in his right hand, almost playfully. The mouth pointed at the wall, then at Beatrice, lingering briefly, then gliding to the side. After a few moments, Sigart put the weapon back on the table, frowning as if he wasn’t sure quite what he was doing.

  ‘You lost your family in a forest fire,’ Beatrice began hastily. ‘That was here. We’re in the cellar of the building you rented.’

  He nodded. ‘Correct.’

  ‘You got called away by a client, and that’s why you hold yourself responsible for what happened – but not just yourself.’

  ‘Another point.’ With the two remaining digits of his left hand, he traced the line of a long cut in the wooden table. ‘To start with, admittedly, it was different. Back then I thought I was the only guilty one, just me alone – but then … what happened then, Beatrice?’

  She remembered the tobacco tin. TFTC.

  ‘Then you stumbled upon the cache and found out that five people must have been here on the day of the fire.’

  ‘Not just that. Think, Beatrice, you know everything. Draw the correct conclusion. Don’t disappoint me.’